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If you haven’t already realized, Firefox 10 is now available, and we definitely recommend that you upgrade. As far as the UI is concerned, the most notable change is to the “forward” button. That is that there isn’t one, at least unless you hit the “back” button first. New APIs allow for Anti-aliased WebGL graphics, full screen viewing of apps, and a few other nifty features. CSS 3D transitions are now supported as well.

Of course with all new things there are bound to be a few problems, and with Firefox 10 on OS X, Silverlight videos don't load and there are some jerky Gmail scrolling problems (as well as general trackpad scrolling issues) that Mozilla needs to get sorted out.

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In its emulation of Google Chrome's quick release schedule, version 7 of Firefox has already appeared in Mozilla's Aurora incubation channel, while version 6 has moved to beta.

Neither version brings the kind of major changes we've become used to in full version number upgrades of Firefox, but they do add welcome performance boosts, standards support, and minor interface and functional tweaks.

Under Mozilla's new Rapid Release calendar, new versions of Firefox will come out every six weeks; this way you'll know it's time for a haircut when a new Firefox version appears. Firefox 6 is scheduled to be ready for release on August 16, while version 7 will move to the beta channel on the same day. Version 7 then moves to the release channel on September 27, at which time Version 8 goes to beta. You get the picture.

Note that the release dates pertain to Firefox for Android as well to the Windows, Mac, and Linux desktop versions, though the mobile browser gets different features than the desktop version in each release.

Mozilla is borrowing a page from Google Chrome and speeding up the development cycle for Firefox releases, setting new iterations of the browser for fixed time periods and bulldozing over features that just aren't ready to make it into a new browser release.

And if Mozilla sticks by its newly proposed plan, that means that we'll be seeing Firefox 5 on June 21—following a shortened 13-week development cycle instead of the proposed 18-week cycle for all future Firefox builds.

Within this 18-week cycle comes a new development stage that adds on to Mozilla's three previous update channels: Nightly, or builds created from the mozilla-central-repository that are highly unstable, but incorporate the latest texts and fixes; Beta, which ups the quality demands of features and tweaks added via the nightly builds; and Release, which becomes the version of Firefox that most consumers are used to using.

Mozilla's new stage, Aurora, will be a nightly update that splits the difference between the chaos of the company's Mozilla-central build (or Nightly build), and its Beta build.

Mozilla's popular open-source, community-developed browser has been updated to Firefox 4.0 today. Users can now download the significantly overhauled software in 75 languages from www.firefox.com. Versions are available for Windows (including the popular XP, shunned by the also-new Internet Explorer 9), Mac OS, and Linux.

The new browser version was announced on the Mozilla blog in a post lengthily titled "Mozilla Launches Firefox 4 and Delivers a Fast, Sleek and Customizable Browsing Experience to More Than 400 Million Users Worldwide."

The browser that pushed Internet Explorer to stop resting on its laurels after years of stagnation has now been pushed by Google's newer Chrome browser to do just the same. Not that Firefox had been stagnating the way that IE had been before the Mozilla browser's debut. But Chrome has served as inspiration for the new version of Firefox in more ways than one—improved speed and a simplified interface are standout examples of this.

Gary Kovacs, CEO of Mozilla, commented, "Mozilla is very proud of Firefox 4, created by our community of thousands of volunteers worldwide. It truly is the browser for tomorrow's Web. The Internet has become the most important connection mechanism in our society, which is why we've focused on making users' Web experience as fast, modern, safe and intuitive as possible."

Mozilla on Wednesday released the Firefox 4 release candidate, the final update before the company formally unveils its next-generation browser.

Those who have been testing Firefox 4 will be automatically upgraded to the RC. Mozilla said it has fixed more than 8,000 bugs since the first beta release of Firefox 4, but encouraged RC users to test this latest release as well and provide feedback.

Mozilla executives expect the final Firefox 4 to be released later this month.

Firefox 4 is a major upgrade for Mozilla. It will feature a revamped plug-in architecture called JetPack, a redesigned minimalist interface, faster JavaScript performance, and greater support for HTML5, including Google's WebM HTML5 video format.

Mozilla has streamlined the user interface, collapsing the full menu bar into a small "Firefox" drop-down option on the top left. The tabs are front and center, with the URL and search bars underneath.

Mozilla has finally released the first Firefox 4 beta, and you can download it now. Firefox 4 is a major step up from the previous version, with a redesign of the user interface, greatly improved HTML5 support, hardware-accelerated HD video playback, better add-on support, and a bunch of other new features. Luckily, the Mozilla team has pulled everything together in a blog post to fill you in on all the fun. With Google Chrome gaining on Firefox marketshare, you can bet Mozilla is gonna be pushing the new hotness found in 4.0 hard. You can download Firefox 4 beta 1 now.

RealAudio and ultimately Real Video was the original, old school audio and video compression used on the Internet during the early Web 1.0 days. No doubt that Web 2.0’s rise in popularity was caused in part by YouTube and the ability for its users to easily send video up to a server and have it transcoded and streamed on the fly - without the need for expensive programs like the RealMedia server set.

YouTube leveraged the Adobe Flash technology, which in its infancy, would show only cartoon like video, then incorporated codec, or software decoding support for television like motion video. This has been the standard for video distribution on the Internet, but requires support for software, and only lately has incorporated decoding within hardware. Notably the iPad and iPhone are two such media devices that do not have flash media decoding support due to a long feud between Apple CEO Steve Jobs and Adobe. Jobs calls flash a CPU hog, and a claims it would cut battery life on his devices from 10’s of hours to just an hour if it was supported. Instead, he and many others hope to see HTML5 take a rise to prominence.

In this SXSW 2010 session, Christopher Blizzard, director of developer relations with Mozilla, and Michael Dale, lead developer of the MetaVid project and WikiMedia foundation, go in depth on what HTML5 has to offer as it pertains to video on the web.

Songbird has released its latest version 1.2. Available for Mac, Windows and Linux, the open source music player now includes 2-way synchronization with iTunes, although still not to an iPhone or iPod. Built on the Mozilla platform, Songbird can automatically organize and store your music files. With the use of Last.fm, improvements include new Radio Directory support for browsing and quick links for playing stations previously accessed. Check out their site if you would like to try the free download.

Take that, Vista! Just in case you had forgotten, Tuesday massive download day for the new Firefox 3. We were amazed that over 8 million downloads were made in 24 hours. While Mozilla is still waiting for the official word, we have no doubt that they hit that Guinness world record. If you were part of that, good for you for taking the challenge, and don’t forget to download your certificate that you can proudly display over your cubicle.

Set your calendar for June 17. After being in development for 34 months, Mozilla is finally unleashing Firefox 3 on the general public next Tuesday. The company says that the improved version has more than 15,000 updates, is safer, faster, easier to use, and even better for add-ons. In honor of the event, they have decided to try to set a world’s record for the most downloads in 24 hours. If you would like to participate, you can pledge your support on their site. So far there are over a million who have done so.